Thread by @ChrisO_wiki

1/ The Russian government is blocking Telegram to destroy the Russian people's social connections, says former high-level government advisor German Klimenko. The frank admission has caused outrage among Russian commentators. ⬇️

2/ In an interview with 'Parliamentary Gazette', Klimenko says: "The primary function of any messenger is to create social connections. Therefore, to stop people from using a messenger, these connections must be destroyed."

3/ "In 2018, when Telegram first clashed with [communications regular] Roskomnadzor, the latter managed to knock out about 10 percent of social connections: let's say, I have a thousand contacts in the messenger, 100 stopped working, and 900 remained.

4/ "Now the goal is to do the opposite: to make those 900 drop out for one reason or another, while the 100 remain.

5/ "This is called 'destroying the social graph.' If a messenger stops fulfilling its primary function and connecting you with the vast majority of people, using it simply becomes pointless."

6/ Not surprisingly, this has prompted outrage from Russian commentators on Telegram. 'Under the ice' comments indignantly:

"I'm embarrassed to ask, but why did you decide to destroy the social connections of Russian citizens? For what purpose?"

7/ "And yes, to what extent does such political practice comply with current legislation, including the Russian Constitution, which guarantees the right to access information?

8/ "This simply resembles the behavior of cartoonish villains from cheap movies. Or, conversely, parody comedies like Austin Powers.

We have no motivation whatsoever. We simply do evil because we can."

9/ Alex Kartavykh is outraged: "What assholes! At least now you know what the point of this is. The point is for you to break down and leave. That's all."

10/ Vladimir Grubnik is equally angry, calling it an "open admission of sabotaging Russian society's social ties and openly working for the enemy."

11/ Sergey Kolyasnikov says that "the point is to destroy civil society and the horizontal connections formed since the beginning of the Special Military Operation. That's to put it bluntly."

12/ However, what all of these commentators miss (or perhaps do not dare to say) is that the Putin regime has been intent for years on atomising Russian society, and has passed numerous pieces of repressive legislation to do so.

13/ Its laws on 'foreign agents' and 'undesirable organisations' have repeatedly been used to shut down civil society organisations. The blocking of Telegram is nothing new; all that's changed is that previously pro-government commentators are now being affected. /end

Sources:
🔹 pnp.ru/social/telegra…
🔹 t.me/podled/16509
🔹 t.me/AlexCarrier/15…
🔹 t.me/SergeyKolyasni…
🔹 t.me/ghost_of_novor…